


Closer Than Most

by endingthemes



Category: X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) - Fandom, X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Cardigans, Erik is Crushing Harder than a 12-year Old Girl, Fluff, M/M, Romance, Smitten Erik
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-10
Updated: 2015-09-10
Packaged: 2018-04-20 03:53:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,667
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4772519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/endingthemes/pseuds/endingthemes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Charles asks his friend Erik to help him pick out clothes for a date.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Closer Than Most

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [[授权翻译]Closer Than Most亲密无间](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6797215) by [Shame_i_translate](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shame_i_translate/pseuds/Shame_i_translate)



> I wrote this on [tumblr](http://endingthemes.tumblr.com/) many moons ago and wanted to move some of my fic over here for safekeeping.

“What about this one?” Charles asks, holding up a blue cardigan. It looks expensive, and knowing Charles, it no doubt is, but it’s definitely neither fresh nor cool. **  
**

“Where are you going again?” Erik asks. He doesn’t want to be here doing this, but Charles asked, and frankly, Erik’s incapable of saying no to Charles. He’s not proud of it, but he’s man enough to admit it.

“Nicola's,” Charles replies, and Erik manages to hold back his wince. His favorite restaurant. He’s actually glad he didn’t hear that when Charles had first called and asked him for this favor. His mind had been too busy shutting down from angry despair to process what Charles had said after his initial request.

“So you can be casual. No need for a suit or something stuffy like a cardigan,” he says. He’s proud. That came out perfectly, condescendingly normal.

Charles makes a face, his mouth twisting and nose wrinkling. “Cardigans are not stuffy. They’re all-purpose garments.”

Erik bites back the smile threatening to break out. “It’s a date, Charles. You should wear something cool. Something with a bit of sex appeal.”

“Cardigans have sex appeal!” Charles insists, clutching his blue cardigan close to his chest, and honestly, Erik can’t argue with that. He’s always found Charles incredibly attractive in his stupid cardigans, but he’s pretty sure Charles would look gorgeous in anything.

Not that any of that matters.

“No cardigans.” He snatches it from Charles’ hand and throws it aside. “You want to impress this guy, right?”

Charles nods eagerly, and it’s a little unfair how much that makes Erik’s chest ache. He watches Charles head back into his outrageously large walk-in closet and tries to take a few deep breaths.

He’s here to help Charles pick an outfit for his hot date tonight.

It doesn’t matter that he’s helplessly and hopelessly in love with Charles. Charles asked for help, and Erik’s going to give it.

Charles appears at the closet door again, holding up a tweed jacket with elbow patches with a hesitant, hopeful smile.

Erik rolls his eyes and pushes past Charles into the closet, determined to find something at least semi-trendy in his massive clothes collection. “You do own jeans, right?”

“Of course I do,” Charles says from behind Erik. “They’re over there on that shelf.”

Erik sifts through them, holding them up and straightening them out to check the shape. Charles has surprisingly long legs for his height, and some fitted jeans would definitely highlight that, not to mention how well they’d hug his amazing ass—

Erik shuts that thought down quickly.

“Put these on,” he says gruffly, shoving a pair of jeans at Charles who scrambles to take them.

To Erik’s surprise, Charles drops his sweatpants right there, and Erik’s already caught an eyeful before he tears his gaze away. Black boxer-briefs. Erik had always wondered… and now he knows. He hears the rustling of denim as Charles pulls the jeans on, but now he’s imaging that as the sound of Erik pulling those exact jeans back off and—

“Well?” Charles asks, startling Erik from his quickly developing fantasies. He stands before Erik with his hands on his hips, and yes, these jeans had been a good idea. Without prompting, Charles turns, arching his back slightly to give Erik a frankly unfairly attractive view. “How’s my ass?”

“Perfect,” Erik replies hoarsely, incapable of looking at anything else.

“Great!” Charles says, turning back to Erik with a smile and pulling off his sweatshirt. “What about the top?”

Erik glances to the plain white ceiling for a moment, searching for strength. Charles is now standing half-naked before him, and there’s nothing Erik wants to do more than reach out and draw him close.

With a deep breath, he reins himself in. Charles is getting ready to meet someone else. To go on a date with someone else.

And Erik’s here, as a friend, to help.

“A button-up,” Erik manages finally, looking around at the clothes to keep his eyes off of pale skin and freckles.

“Over here,” Charles says, beckoning Erik to the opposite wall, and Erik concentrates intensely on the shirts as Charles stands next to him, warmth radiating from his bare skin. His hands are shaking as he sorts through the shirts, settling on a black one and pulling it from the rack.

“This one.” He holds the shirt out to Charles, and pretends to still be looking at the others while he watches Charles put it on out of the corner of his eye.

“Alright, how is it?” Charles asks.

Erik examines him, but it doesn’t look quite right. The fit is off, stretched a bit too tight in the shoulders, so he shakes his head. He picks out a light blue one and hands that to Charles, glancing away again as Charles changes.

“Okay,” Charles says finally, smoothing the shirt down. “How about this?”

Erik turns to fully face Charles, and looks him up and down. The shirt is great, highlighting the width of his shoulders and hugging the lines of his body, making him look solid and powerful in comparison to Erik’s own lanky frame. Charles being Charles, however, has buttoned it up to the very top button, making him look closer to a school boy than a hot date.

“Your buttons,” Erik says, with a small smile he can’t repress. “You can’t button up to your neck, Charles.” Erik’s moving before his brain registers what he’s doing, his fingers reaching for the buttons at Charles’ neck and unbuttoning the highest one. Charles is staring up at him with clear blue eyes, blinking when Erik pauses.

“Just one?” Charles asks, his voice quiet.

Erik swallows, dragging his gaze from Charles’ face. “A few more.” He unbuttons one more button, then two, revealing the lines of Charles’ collarbones, and then more of his chest, and though one more would be unseemly, Erik can’t seem to drag his hands away.

He startles when Charles’ hands grip his wrists, holding his hands in place on the shirt, the warmth of Charles’ skin and the strength of his grip stealing Erik’s breath.

“This outfit,” Charles says. “Do you like it?”

“Yes,” Erik responds, surprised his dry throat can even produce sound.

Charles smiles up at him, squeezing Erik’s wrists. “It’s good for a date?”

Everything comes crashing down again. This isn’t for him— it’s never been for him, and the worst part is that it never will be.

“Yeah,” Erik says, and tries to free his wrists, but Charles holds him tight, still smiling brightly. For the first time, Erik doesn’t like the sight of Charles smiling. “Let go.”

Charles shakes his head. “Erik, I need to ask you something.”

“I already told you — you look great.”

“Not that,” Charles says, and now his face is losing its smile, becoming far more serious, red lips thinning in determination. “Will you go to Nicola's with me tonight?”

Erik blinks down at Charles, brow furrowing. “Your date might not like that.”

“As my date,” Charles says, and he looks earnest, completely open, his eyes searching Erik’s.

“Did he cancel?” Erik asks, and Charles sighs, finally releasing Erik’s wrists.

“You’re not this stupid, Erik.”

Erik bristles at that. “I was stupid enough to come help when you called!”

“Don’t yell at me!” Charles yells back. “I’m asking you out, you idiot!”

Erik’s retort dies in his throat and instead, “ _You what_?” slips out.

“I called you to my room, undressed in front of you, let you dress me up how you like, and am taking you to your favorite restaurant. Obviously I’m asking you out! I did this all for you!”

“Oh,” Erik says, feeling the anger abruptly drop, leaving him clumsily juggling confusion and arousal.

“Well?” Charles prompts.

Erik continues staring dumbly.

Charles lets out an exasperated chuckle and reaches for Erik’s face, pulling him down until their lips are nearly touching. “You’re hopeless,” he whispers against Erik’s mouth before he’s kissing him, and Erik’s too baffled and turned on and happy to even bother with biting out a denial, content to take over the kiss, finally able to do what he’s been dreaming about for months.

“You planned this on purpose?” Erik asks against Charles’ lips between increasingly heated kisses. It’s all a bit maddening, but Charles has always been driving him crazy, and Erik’s found it harder and harder to separate his annoyance with Charles from his desire for Charles.

“Pretty good, right?” Charles says with a smile Erik can feel, and he lets out a near squeak when Erik bites his bottom lip in rebuke.

“You’re an ass,” Erik says, a low growl in his throat, backing Charles up until he has him trapped against the closet door, completely boxed in by Erik’s body.

Charles winds his arms around Erik’s neck, one hand pushing up into Erik’s hair where it curls slightly at the nape of his neck. “But you like my ass.” Erik shuts Charles up with his tongue, and he gasps when Erik grinds against him, his breath coming in hot pants against Erik’s mouth.

Erik draws away suddenly, and Charles whimpers in loss, his eyes dazed with arousal as he looks at Erik in confusion. “Wha—” he starts, but Erik’s already moving him aside and walking out of the closet.

“We’re going to be late for dinner,” Erik says, grabbing his coat from where he’d left it on Charles’ bed.

“What?” Charles splutters, stumbling out of the closet, looking completely debauched, his shirt skewed and his excitement obviously straining his jeans. “We could just skip dinner,” he offers, voice tight in desperation.

Erik smirks. “I was promised a hot date. Let’s go.”

“Erik,” Charles whines, but Erik ignores him as he walks away. He’ll tease Charles all throughout dinner and drag it out as long as possible, until Charles is practically begging Erik to take him right there in public.

There’s nothing Erik loves more than a little payback.

Except maybe Charles.  


End file.
